


10:17:22

by Hikou



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-21 23:21:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11367744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hikou/pseuds/Hikou
Summary: My story is waiting to be signed. My Death Note has been waiting so long for a name. And so I finish it. And I barely have time to admire the work because it's already 10:10 PM. The first name I've written in my Death Note is my own. [Self-insert-tastic]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Lol. This is almost 10 years old. 
> 
> Written because Bby sent me a notebook in the post.

I make it halfway through the H before I pause, and my hand has to retreat over the crinkled pages--each one carefully bubbled up by a word I'd meticulously selected, every tiny letter care-worn across the paper between work and sleep and life. 

The print is small, the letters squished, because I'd only had 72 10x7 inch pages to work with, and I'd finished with one line to spare. The cramped writing emphasizes the large, bold lettering of the name. 

**ASH.**

And my pen touches back down to scrawl out an **L** and an **E**.

It's a good enough story, I decide. Maybe the best I've ever written. I've read it over several times in the past few days, reliving every error, preparing myself for every heart-wrenching pain I'd given myself, because I was not the sort of girl who believed in happy endings. 

And even if I was, I wasn't the sort of girl who had them. 

**Y**.

I wonder for a second if the girl who sent me this terrible joke will ever be informed of its results--this friend somewhere west of here who thought a book titled _Death Note_ would make me smile. More than likely it was just a pad of paper with a stylized stamp, but I'd treated it with reverence ever since I'd ripped it out of its over-taped, white postal-box. I'd thought very carefully about what should be written on this useless pad of paper. 

**ASHLEY.**

****To be perfectly honest with you, people I knew came to mind first. Small tests that I wouldn't miss. In the same instant, people I didn't know shot to mind--political leaders, celebrities, names and faces I didn't really understand. I really chose a few. I really thought about it, but I never could bring myself to take pen to paper on it.

I fear I'm not as cruel as I wish I were. 

Or maybe, I'm simply more afraid than I let on. Of mores and social niceties, sociological rules I'm too scared to break. The solution became strikingly obvious too quickly to realize.

**M.**

I include my middle initial for some reason, so not to stress some supernatural power somewhere with two mes, not bold enough to emblazon the whole name on the paper, like a credit card. 

The pen lifts to space, and presses back into the paper so hard I'm sure the ink has bled onto the next six pages. I cannot move it. 

I'm secretly ashamed this might work. 

**ASHLEY M.** stares up at me, waiting to be finished, and I fear my mother will find this next to the body. I can't understand why I care, but I can only stop long enough to feel guilty, because the space pressing between M. and **Monday, May the 5th, 2008, 10:17:22 PM** is begging to be filled. I've committed too much thought to this project to stop now. I can't find a good enough excuse to abandon it. 

My story is waiting to be signed. 

My Death Note has been waiting so long for a name. 

And so I finish it. And I barely have time to admire the work because it's already 10:10 PM. 

The first name I've written in my Death Note is my own. 

I slap the notebook shut and my eyes graze over the note I'd left on the front of their own accord.

_Ashley,_  
I thought this might solve some of your problems. Be sure to let me know if it works!  
Love-- 

__and I never get to read the name written there, though I know it's the girl from afar, the one I've never really met.

I miss the creaking sound as the ceiling fan detaches itself from the ceiling, there's not enough time between its faulty bolting and the ground where I sit writing to scream, but I swear I hear that sick crunch when it finally makes contact with the back of my head. I can feel the jarring vibrations from ear to tooth, and I don't have to reach around and check for wetness to know how badly I'm bleeding. 

In a morbid way, I want to laugh. I'm the sick sort of person who finds this funny. I demand death for the price of opportunity. 

And now I know that it works. 

I wonder if anyone will tell her. 

That it's worked. 

That the clever web I've spun has begun to unravel and rework itself. 

That the words underneath my name are starting to disappear.


	2. Chapter 2

The images flash so quick I don't have time to process that I've seen them once before. More realistic now, somehow less important. It seems that with every pulse of light, every twitch of movement between optical nerve and brain, a memory is being stripped away. 

Torn smiles and cynical eyes leer against busy city backdrops and open skies. Ruffled wings flap above my face, close enough to feel, far enough not to see, and as the figure moves, gliding across his cloudless blue curtain, an object falls, gaining momentum with each passing instant. And though it flutters so helplessly, like a bird with a broken wing, I know it'll cleave my head in two if it makes contact. 

I roll out of harm's way before my eyes have even opened, up off my back, and on to all fours, and I pretend not to hear my own choked croak of a gasp when my hands _squelch_ into the ground. I hadn't expected for it to be raining. 

Because the sun had shone so bright and the air had been so cool inside my head. 

I realize I've already opened my eyes when I see my fingers curl in the grass. It's all so dark, my pale fingers are the only thing registering right now, scattered in a graveyard of ripped and water-logged flower petals, bruised and trod upon. I watch them stumble to the side where I know it should've landed, and though I can't see that black outline, my heart slithers up and out of my throat when my hand grazes that familiar leather. 

I struggle to cover the escape with a cough. 

I clutch the notebook to my chest, and rock back into a sitting position, ignoring the splash the drowned-yard makes in protest. The back of my shirt is already soaked through, and I don't have to wonder how long I'd been laying there, shivering in the rain, because I know it must've been close to a small eternity. Though I try to scowl through each puff of breath I huff out at passing students, scowling back at me, I find it hard to maintain a stable expression between sniffles. 

But I like the rain, anyway, I try to remind myself--even if my hair is plastered heavily over my eyes, and even if I can feel how swollen my throat is, and even if I can _see_ the heat just evaporating off of my skin.

It doesn't work particularly well. 

Mostly because my face won't stop leaking.

But I swipe the back of my hand across my face and do my damnedest to make believe this is all according to plan, and that I really had thought this thing through. In the same instant my nails claw around the edge of this leather-bound cover I haven't bothered yet to read, and swing the unprotected pages out into the rain. 

The water has already soaked through the edges, but the center of the paper remains dry for now, reflecting a brutal white emptiness up at me, and I have to rub at my eyes to be sure I haven't forgotten how to read or haven't forgotten how to see because the page is heartbreakingly blank. 

I turn it, to be sure. 

And again.

And again.

And again.

And again. And again. And again.

I pick up a whole section and let the edges of the book sift past my thumb. 

But nothing happens.

They remain blank, and smooth, untouched as if I hadn't signed a soul to them, and a heavy ache settles in my chest, just underneath the swollen glands in my throat, because I don't know how to break the spell and I don't know what words had filled them once. 

I didn't remember how to fill them again.

I move to close the back cover, trying to choke my heart back down my throat another time, when I notice the smudge of black arched across my thumb. I have to drop the book, leave it floating peacefully in the puddle-cemetery of flower petals, to pull my hand up to my face, hold my thumb out for examination. I twist my wrist painfully to the side to read. 

_5th, /008, 10/17_

__The pool of water seems unreasonably warm when my hand plunges back in to retrieve the notebook, and the dripping remnants of it chill so ridiculously fast on my skin when I whip the back cover open again, and I have to pound on my chest to cough my heart back down this time when I read the tiny print in the bottom left corner, upside down and smudge, but pressed into the paper so hard it might as well have been carved.

**Monday, May the 5th, 2008, 10:17:22 PM**

****I want to laugh, but my throat constricts and all I can do is hack out the heavy air trapped there. It takes a moment of emptying and refilling my lungs before I'm steady enough to stand, my feet stomp into the puddle I sat in, and drag three more petals to their doom, tearing one down the center as I move away. The Death Note finds a safe place nestled between my elbow and ribcage, tucked away under my shirt, as I wring the few thousand gallons of water from my clothing and do my best to claw my hair dry. Raindrops prick against my neck, warning against the futility of this task.

Eventually, I concede defeat and walk away.

It seems stupid that I should not have been looking up, or planning, or at least seeking some place warm and dry, but for the moment I was content in watch my feet trudge along, relishing the feel of my soles scraping across the sidewalk. It felt like progress, even if it wasn't, and by time I saw another pair of feet in front of mine, I could step aside in time. 

But there were no feet in front of mine. 

There was only the erratic, rhythmless beat of sky against the earth, as I made impact with something as cold, and wet, and _hard_ as I was, punctuated by my skull sounding like it was multi-fracturing against the pavement again. My head hurt less than my tailbone did, though, and so I laid there for a moment, willing my momentary paralysis to ebb away, trying to pretend that the wings stretched out above my head were still too far to see, even though they were definitely close enough to feel. 

He looked like he was smiling, his mouth torn unnaturally nearly from ear to ear in a clownish display, lips perpetually pulled back to reveal jagged teeth with about as much consistency and lethality as a shark's maw. His eyes had a similar quality to them, the sockets torn so slightly at the edges, covered carefully in a blackness that only served to emphasize the unearthly paleness of the skin stretched over his bones, stapled over his body in long, haphazard stitches under the collarbones. Long, bony arms dangled from each shoulder in much the same nature of the chains dangling from his waist, as this creature peered over to inspect whatever it was he'd unwittingly struck. 

Without warning, I sneezed. 

And I didn't realize he had a long foot planted on either side of my body until he stumbled backwards and nearly tripped over me. Black wings flapped once, twice, three times before he regained his poor but upright posture behind my scrambling feet. He seemed puzzled but not perturbed as his face turned from me to his companion, who I took into account for the first time since my head had hit the ground. 

The only profound thing that struck me upon seeing the boy was that his umbrella did not quite match. It seemed to sink into the sky behind the light tans and khakis he'd draped himself in, and by time it occurred to me to look at his face, or wonder why he was looking at me with that perfect mixture of loathing and panic, the creature had begun speaking. 

"Hey, Light," was the call in a surprisingly human-sounding voice, "why can she see me. You didn't touch her with the note too? That's boring, using the same trick twice." I had to wonder how he didn't cut his tongue on his teeth forming those words. 

But this boy, he didn't say anything. He just stood there watching me, and I have to say I lost interest fairly quickly. My eyes were on the creature next to him, and it was fairly obvious what I was looking at. Even standing straight, I had to crane my neck to study the warped face. For some reason, I found it immutably entertaining, intriguing to an absolute fault. 

A hand reached out of its own accord, to set the earring hanging from his face swinging, and I nearly lost a finger the instant I made contact, shark teeth snapping at my flesh. 

But a new pair of hands had pulled me back in time, spun me around with a familiar looking tan jacket draped over my shoulders. 

It was unnerving how quickly he could change faces. 

This boy, smiling down at me with the utmost concern and innocence painted upon his features, was more frightening than his monster. I would be lying if I said I didn't jump when he casually placed a hand on my back, to guide me down the sidewalk. 

I would be lying if I said I didn't consider running for my life at that moment. 

I would be lying if I said my heart didn't fail its great escape, slip and plummet to the bottom of my shoes, knock itself against three ribs on the way down, when I heard that low voice for the first time. 

"No, but we'll find out, Ryuk. We'll find out."


	3. Chapter 3

Ryuk, I decide, is a lot like an antique shop, as my fingers slip past my vision for the fourteenth time, at least, to try and pluck a feather from his shoulder--old, exotic, too expensive to keep, impractical for everyday use, kinda smelly too, but fun to look at. And even though the sign says _Do not touch_ , and your mother's threatened you under pain of death--

"LADY, C'MON."

\--somehow you always manage to be there when the showroom piece shatters to its well-deserved grave. 

Triumphantly, I spin the feather between my forefinger and thumb, relishing in the black cyclone the streaked motion creates, and I've spent such a countless stretch of sidewalk, and so many annoying keycard beeps to this dim, corner table, that it's a physical effort for me not to cry when the boy plucks it from my fingers and delivers it back into the creature's eager claws. 

_Break it up, kids,_ is what he echoes fatherly in my mind, but the still air around me quivers with the command of, "This is serious."

"Is it really?" are the words that trickle out of my mouth before I have time to really process them, a dull repetition, a bid for time. When he scowls his answer, I am forced concede defeat to the universe, because in the back of my mind I realize Yagami Light would be a terrible father, and so I offer up the most attention I can scratch together for the boy, while trying to will my right arm invisible, so that I might not be scolded for testing just how far the tear of a smile carved into his demon's mouth stretched. "Fine."

Vision locked on Light, my finger overshoots and hits Ryuk in the eye. The demon howls, and the sound swells to fill every spare inch of the deserted library I've become a captive to. There's a rush of air as his head thumps to the table, but the boy proceeds calmly. "Do you know what Ryuk is?" 

"Ugly as sin," skips out again before being properly filtered. I have the good grace to glance away at this outburst, fidgeting uncomfortably in my soggy chair. This feels too much like a psychological exam I'm failing. 

But I'm relieved to know that he's not doing so hot either. 

"Serious," is the wrong answer, even ground out in that poor attitude he gives me. Yagami Light, with his perfectly pressed uniform and his no-nonsense expression clearly has better things to be doing with his time. My elbow fights to dig harder into my side, and the corner of the Death Note still tucked safely under my shirt wedges itself into my ribs. I have to wonder if he can see it; I don't look down to check. 

I glance at the creature, seated directly to my right, so large that his back has to bend at an unnatural angle to hunch on the table the way that he is, one clawed hand cupped over his left eye, tongue practically lolling out between spiked teeth. 

"A cyclops?" I guess again. His face darkens, and I have to admit, "I should really be taking this more seriously," scratching the back of my neck.

It seems Ryuk has retreated to the other side of the table now, clawed his way to Light's side instead of my own, and privately, I'm jealous and a little frightened. In all honesty, it's easier to pretend the scenery isn't perfect for a B-rate horror movie when you've got an obnoxiously grotesque byproduct of the natural order to keep you busy, and the silence crashing over the room in the steady wavelengths of my own heartbeat is starting to sink in. How far I can _actually_ see around me in this poor lighting dawns slowly, as I start picking murder weapons to pitch to Light like a bad game of Clue. 

_Ashley, in the Library, with the Encyclopedia Britannica._

I give the book a once over; it's no revolver, but a couple of solid blows to the head and I think Volume J-K might have a decent shot of taking me out. 

Cautiously, I edge it farther away from his half the table. 

But when I look up, there's no suspect with chalk-lined bodies and caved-in skulls dancing above his head like sugar plum fairies. There's just a boy with a new mask painted on his face, calm and serene as the peaceful ocean scene I feel he should be watching. His hands are folded neatly on the table in front of him, casual and loose, no malice or excess anger forcing him to squeeze the grip too hard. His smile is soft and encouraging, mild enough to almost be believable. 

Somehow, though, this demure boy with his fake smiles and harmless questions is ten times more threatening than the Light swinging reference books to kill in my head. 

Twenty steps backwards. It's finally dawned on him he's left a vital part of our interview out. "I'm Yagami Light, of To-ou University; who are you?" 

The final gear, pulling back this new curtain finally stops, and very suddenly it all ceases to be funny and light. The haze of my mind snaps to the sharp reality this bad joke has become, what feels like this incredibly intimate game of chess between myself and this boy I really don't know. 

I'm ashamed to have time to think about this. I'm embarrassed of my answer. 

"Hikou."

Because I know it's wrong. And I can call myself this thing until I am blue in the face, but it does not make me this thing.

I can't tell if it's more strange feeling the guilt, or to feel guilty.

He's already running with it. "Hikou." I can feel my heart beat in the bottom of my ribcage, like it's burrowed away to hide itself. "Forgive me for saying, but that's a little strange, isn't it." But feeling it beat here is just making me nauseous. "What I mean is, you don't look Japanese." 

Perhaps, though, this is not even my heart. It's beating too fast, and I think someone might've gypped me for a hummingbird heart. I couldn't recall any shady transplants recently, though. "I'm not." 

"Oh?" he asks, and my tongue goes numb because I don't know how to answer a question like 'Oh?' I'm halfway through swallowing the useless thing before I realize I don't have to. "Do you live in Japan then?"

"No." 

"No?" sounds too much like 'Oh?' "You're visiting?" 

I was too busy coughing on my own words to answer, something was digging into my side. 

"You know, this is trespassing right now," he warned. The notebook, I remembered, was pressed into my skeleton, prying my heart back into its proper place, even though I swore it sunk another four inches down when he leaned in so close there wasn't enough light left to illuminate his face, when he just _breathed,_ "I don't need a Death Note to deal with you." 

I stood so fast my chair toppled backwards, nearly loudly enough to cover Ryuk's unabashed laughter. 

The boy was sitting there, an expectant modification of Rodin's Thinker, one hand curled under his chin, eyes downcast, one stretched outward, waiting for the square I now realized was plainly visible under my shirt. The pose was somehow benevolent, yet poisonous. His demeanor so subtly sinister. His voice was so unshakingly promising. "I can find a place for you to stay, and I can protect you, and I can _help you_." 

And the worst part was it was true. 

He _could_. 

Because this boy had things I didn't, and knew things I didn't, and had piece of the puzzle that I didn't have. Even something as simple as shelter was swinging over my head, the string it was attached to dangling from the fingers of this boy. 

But _would_ he?

It would be painstakingly easy for him to be rid of me. I had no passport, I had no ID, I had _nothing._ I was a call away from becoming a detainee. 

So was the rectangle tucked under my shirt. 

I couldn't not smile as this clicked into place: he could make this so easy for me, he could make this so hard. Temptation personified, this was Yagami Light, and, if not for the demon sitting at his side, I might have believed him. 

But there was still enough light left to see Ryuk, balancing precariously in his chair--his malicious smile exposed, his dirty eyes unhidden, no mask on his face. Ryuk was Light, just turned inside out. 

So I clapped his expectant hand in an amicable way and grinned. "I do appreciate your concern, Light, but _I_ don't need any help." Though, I thought maybe he might, if I ever scrounged up enough cash for a pen.


	4. Chapter 4

It smelled like dust. 

Which was amazing, in and of itself, because my nose was so stuffy I wasn't even fully certain I still _had_ one, until I pulled it out of the book that had served as my pillow. 

Volume J-K, flipped open at random, was the source of the offensive scent, pressing maybe four centimeters from my face at most. I had to prop an elbow on either side of the book just to force my head far enough back for the page to actually come into focus. There was a sharp pull behind each of my shoulders with the tiny movement, as if I were trying to flex bone instead of muscle tissue. 

"Jesus Christ," I had to mutter ironically, letting my head snap back down onto the table top. 

Because it was Jesus Christ staring back up at me, wedged carefully in his place between a map of Jervis Bay and a diagram of a Jet Engine. My head bobbed up again, to take in this information. There was a short paragraph, detailing the photo, listing facts and credits, and though it really shouldn't have been all that out of place or surprising, I found the page particularly alarming. 

The book had been slammed shut before I'd figured out why I'd been sleeping on it, and my joints had all sprung into a locked position, forcing me up and out of my chair, before I'd remembered where I was. 

A room. 

A quiet room. 

A quiet, dirty room. 

And this was only first strike. 

There were small details that were most prominent--the way rays of sunlight down-slanted through the blinds of the window, offsetting the whirlwind of dust in the air, how ridiculously large the wooden chairs were comparatively to their table-counter parts, or maybe just the fact that the book I'd slammed shut was red, not dark burgundy old tome - red, but that strikingly bright color that seemed so familiar. 

It was such an odd thing to have to recall. 

Mechanically, I picked the thing up, let it rest in the crook of my elbow as my feet struck into a motion I hadn't yet commanded. 

It had been a bright red book, that awful old thing he'd given me. It was supposed to have been his father's, and then his father's before him, and that room had looked a lot like this one. All small tables and big chairs, dirty sunlight, and that old-paper smell. I couldn't recall him reading anything from it or saying anything profound. 

I just remembered that it was the only thing of his I kept, even though in all my years of ownership I'd never had much use for a bible. 

It'd been so long since I thought about my father. 

My arm extended and the book lost its balance, plummeting helplessly into the mesh-metal bin beneath it, now forever doomed to keep company with gum-wrappers and scrapped thesis statements. At least, unless someone was bright enough to fish the Encyclopedia Britannica out of the garbage. 

The point was, he didn't belong here. 

But then again, "Neither do I." 

I was startled by the sound of my own voice, unaware I'd worked myself into that state of delirium already, but it was a nice, grounding sound in a place so deserted as this. To-ou University Library. It must've been a Sunday, or impossibly early, or maybe a holiday, to be as empty as it was, but I suppose I should've been grateful because there was no one to see when I reached behind the check-out desk and took a handful of pens out of the _#1 Librarian_ cup, or when I was lucky enough to flip open the box filled with late-fee cash, or when I swiped the apple whatever old coot ran the place had left on her desk. 

I should've really thought twice about leaving; it was a nice place to crash, and I doubted the meager change I'd pocketed would cover any habitable lodgings, but the place was loaded with allergens and nostalgia--two things I didn't cope well with. 

So I took a bite out of my apple and headed out the front doors.

The world had been transformed. 

The sky had magically untangled itself from clashing clouds to a blue so clear and uplifting it was hard to imagine that it ever had an end. The sun, unobscured, revealed the trees and flowers at their vibrant summer best. Chipmunks chirped, birds sang, life was beautiful. 

But it still felt so indescribably empty. As if I'd stumbled out into a ghost town. 

I thought it was a baseball diamond at first when I found them--the reason why the library had been empty, the courtyard deserted. The crowd was so large all I could see where the high chain-linked fences at first, but eventually they gave way to the green of a tennis court, carefully caged in except for one empty bench. 

It wasn't hard to push my way to the front, and it was equally simple to pretend I didn't hear Ryuk's angry sound-effects when I leaned over, elbows propped on the back of his court-side seat. "Tennis, huh?" 

The ball shot across the net almost too rapidly to keep track of, bouncing between the boy I knew as Light and a companion to whom I'd yet to be introduced. 

"That's kinda lame..." I decided aloud.

It seemed as if Ryuk was not in the speaking mood. 

I took an especially loud bite out of my apple. 

And very suddenly, he was all ears. His head cocked sharply to the side, his big fish-eyes never leaving the fruit gripped in my hand. His teeth snapped at it so fast I hardly had time to jerk my hand away before I lost a finger. 

I took another bite, and I swear, the thing _whined_. 

"So how long have they been at it?" I asked between chews. Clearly this wasn't any sort of official competition, though Light was certainly close enough to uniform and the spectators were damn close to rioting. I doubted any university worth it's money would send a boy out to compete in those beat-up jeans that pale boy was wearing. 

"For _ever,_ " was the less than helpful answer. 

His approach was new this time around, mouth slowly opening and head moving forward at sloth-speed, like he could sneak a bite in. Casually, I spun the fruit by the stem, lifting it up and away from the demon. 

The referee was shouting something, arm raised in Light's direction, and the crowd went wild. I assumed this meant he had won. Ryuk looked as disinterested as I felt, solely involved with his apple now. He made another sharp snap, this time hitting his target with a satisfying _crunch_. I'd been too busy staring at this new boy to yank the thing away. 

He was weird-looking.

And this was understatement at its best. 

He'd appeared relatively normal on the opposite side of the net, too far away to properly examine, just a pale streak of white skin and blue jean, but now that he had no distance to obscure his face and no racket to extend his arms he appeared almost as an entirely different creature. 

He looked a lot like a ghost, I decided. One from an old, old Japanese horror movie, with the shockingly white pallor and the dark circles under his impossibly wide eyes. His posture was absolutely disgusting, shoulders perpetually hunched and elbows pulled into his sides as if they did not have the ability to bend. When he picked things up and held them so awkwardly from his fingertips I thought he looked an awful lot like a T-rex. 

And he talked funny. Conversational pauses were absent from his speech, as if his mind moved so much faster than his mouth that he'd already determined what he was going to say thirty seconds prior, and it flew out of his mouth at such a speed I felt like an idiot taking time to actually process what he said. 

I hadn't even noticed when he'd wandered over, Light not far behind him. 

It took a moment to realize it was the track bag filled with Light's things they were after, not me, but I still yanked the core Ryuk had left me out of his mouth so quickly I was surprised I didn't pull any teeth with it, and I slipped off into the droves of dispersing spectators so quickly and carelessly that I was sure you could trace my path straight through them just by the people I nearly knocked down. 

I couldn't get far enough fast enough, though, because even pressed with wall-to-wall students I could still hear Ryuk calling over his shoulder, exposing my position, "Hey! Hikou! Bring more apples next time!" 

Maybe I ought to. 

Poisoned ones.


	5. Chapter 5

  
"Can I get you anything else, ma'am?"

I was actually a little startled at the question, more surprised that she'd come back after the first three times I'd bashfully sent the poor woman back with drinks I suddenly remembered I didn't like.

You couldn't have determined this was really a covert stealth-operation when I set my pen down next to my notebook, folded my hands neatly on top of my work, and asked in the most innocent voice I could muster if, "You guys have any crayons?"

The expression on her face was priceless, and I wish I could've laughed, but I couldn't afford to be drawing attention to myself. Nonetheless, Ryuk's guffaw was loud enough for the both of us, and he nearly knocked over the juice I'd finally settled on to no benefit of my own. "I think... uhh... let me check."

I felt disembodied and slightly haunted, and it wasn't just because I knew Light was doing his best to mentally set me on fire without physically exerting any awkward mannerisms somewhere behind me. Something about this cafe set me off.

I knew it hadn't been a good idea to follow them here, Light and his new friend. It was playing with fire, but I'd convinced myself I was just following Ryuk, so it didn't feel half as foreboding when I had to think about the fact that I was probably sitting back-to-back with my arch-nemesis's greatest enemy.

Because that's what I decided Light was.

I don't remember when.

He hadn't realized I was there at first; I'd sat on the side closest to their booth, and at some point Ryuk had grown bored with them and slipped opposite me. I'm sure I wasn't a great conversationalist, but at least I talked back and offered free food, something Light was indisposed to do at the moment.

My head fit just under the wall of too-many fake plants they lined the tables with, and I had to have a private snicker when the boy proudly announced that "no one can hear what we're talking about back here." All and all, though, their conversation wasn't profoundly interesting.

I wasn't sure when I'd set this awful **plan** into motion, when I'd thought of it, but at some point my achingly blank Death Note had been laid open in front of me, and one of my stolen pens had been uncapped.

I smiled and thanked the poor waitress when she set down all the crayons everyone hated--the kid's meal rejects. I sighed, and set to work changing the sun sketched in my notebook into _vivid tangerine_ in between his wide smile and ultra-cool shades to the beat of that twangy background music.

Haunted.

But I was still relatively calm, though only half as sane. At least I was programmed into this stupid **plan**.

I had to admit the slow pace fit the atmosphere of the place, and the low voice of the man singing was comforting in a sense that was wholly familiar to me, if I stretched it far enough I could almost pretend that tightly-plucked guitar solo sounded natively Japanese. I could pretend the universe wasn't conspiring against me.

"You know who this is, Ryuk?" I asked, turning the grass _green yellow._

When I looked up to pick up the half of a black crayon, the monster was looking up at me, hunched over the table, tongue stuck out into the glass of cider, trying to furtively get the liquid into his mouth. The look on his face screamed _caught_ as I held the _cornflower blue_ crayon up to his face to compare, clearly dissatisfied with my limited selection.

It didn't match at all.

I set to scribbling anyway.

Ryuk pulled his tongue out of the drink cautiously, as if he were suddenly worried I'd stuck some sort of trap into it. "Didn't you say it was supposed to be me?"

 _Supposed to._ I scoffed, turning the book sideways for inspection.

So it was closer to Edvard Munch's Scream than the Mona Lisa.

...

Or maybe it was closer to something out of Sesame Street, but still, it was recognizable and **the plan** didn't require this to be a _good_ portrait.

"I _meant_ the man singing." Who the hell ever used _brick red?_ "Do you know who the man singing is?"

"Some dead human?" was a truthful answer, but not the one I was seeking.

"It's Elvis," I clarified, begrudgingly conceding that my sky had to be _wisteria_ , seeing as it was the only color I had left. "Isn't that weird?"

Ryuk's tongue was shoved too far down into his glass to answer, so I continued without him.

"My dad used to love Elvis." I frowned, setting that awful purple crayon down, inspecting the travesty that had become my sky. "I always thought he kind of looked like him."

"And?"

 _And_ maybe I was becoming a little fixated now. "And I'm done, what'cha think?"

I wasn't sure if he actually choked, or if the demon just spit the liquid out for the effect. Either way, it sprayed all over the table, all over the chair, all over that ugly plastic plant, and up and over the wall separating my table from the one behind me. I dropped the notebook with a terrible clatter, and my heart stopped dead in my chest, sticking to the side of my ribs, probably hoping to sidestep whatever danger I had created.

In a single jerked motion, I made the single greatest movement of my life, completing the quickest thought process I'd ever had.

Jarred quickly, by my outstretched arm, the glass of cider knocked onto the table and shattered into twenty seven lovely little pieces just in time for an inquisitive head to pop up over the clematis line of manufactured leaves, as mine ducked in shame.

"Shit," and I _meant_ it.

This wasn't terrible, though, I tried to convince myself, hands seeking out the dispenser o' napkins on the side of the table. This was just a minor setback, I told myself. Ryuk had just cut a small step out of **the plan** , that was all. This was fixable.

And then that finger came down once.

Twice.

Thrice.

On my head.

And I stopped mopping up the mess Light's ugly little monster had probably made on purpose, just to screw with me, and slowly tilted my head back.

His face was so close to mine, all I saw at first were those huge, dark eyes, that were probably about the size of my terrified ones right now. There really was no where to back to, unless I fancied sinking right off of my seat and under the table, so I just sat there and mumbled my apologies.

"What's that?" he asked, finger tracing itself off of my forehead to point away at the black book, titled _Death Note,_ that had fallen closed in the river of apple cider and glass shards.

"My notebook," I answered.

"Can I see it?" was the immediate reply, as he slipped back behind the screen of leaves until all I could see was his nose and eyes poking out over the top, a hand was waiting expectantly next to the half a face.

"Uh..." my hand scrambled on the table for the book, and I really didn't notice at first when those few little splinters of glass found their way into my palm, bleeding onto the cover as I passed the book up to him.

"Why'd you call it a Death Note?"

I shrugged nervously, turning back to my sad attempt to clean up the disaster area Ryuk had created, piling the dirty napkins on the edge of the table. "It came that way."

"Where'd you get it."

"A friend." Wrapping my nails around one of the painful little slivers I slid it out of skin.

"What's this."

The book was propped open to the first page, a long white finger extending over the barrier between our booths, pointing at my terrible drawing of Ryuk.

And I answered, "Shinigami," without missing a beat.

The boy dropped away out of my line of sight, the sound of his impact echoing from beyond the wall separating us, as the book dropped back onto my bench. I picked it up carefully and wiped it off with the sleeve of my shirt. Really, still, all according to **plan**.

Four shaky, white fingers curled around the side of the wood backing of my bench, followed by another set of four shaky, white fingers, and a familiar looking face popped around the corner. His voice had dropped to a quiet whisper when his mouth slowly opened, and he really asked for the first time, "Why a shinigami?"

The song ended with a bellowing plea and a crash of symbols, and a small pocket of quiet filled the cafe for half an instant.

"It seemed like the sort of thing a Death Note should have."

One of the hands retracted itself from the wall, the boy's thumb pressing to his lower lip thoughtfully. "Would you like to join us..."

I had to wonder if my grin was half as wide as Ryuk's ugly mug. "Hikou, and yes."


	6. Chapter 6

I would be lying if I said I didn't feel left out when everybody's neat little cellphone rang but mine. It would be a gross understatement to say that I felt a little awkward, wedged in the least favorite middle-seat in the back of that ugly cop car all the way to the hospital. Mostly, though, it would be just plain bad acting pretending to care what the status was on the police chief I didn't have a face for--Light's father.

I suppose that was why they left me to wait in the lobby.

But, still, I didn't see why Ryuk had to go with them.

Now wasn't really the time to be gnawing on my own bitterness, though. Really, it was fairly impressive that I'd even scraped along this far, that I'd managed to pass the dinosaur-turned-detective's thinly veiled tests only well enough to not be shackled to the table before I could blink, to have strung him along so keenly on the idea of death gods and occult magic, enough to make him think that maybe I was actually crazy enough to be Kira.

I seriously doubted he thought I was half as brilliant enough to be, though, but he was interested enough to show me those awful photos too, the prints of the suicide notes I hadn't listened too well to earlier. I had pretended to look over them very carefully, had _hmed_ and _ahed_ as I was meant to, had slowly rolled the idea of secret messages into words. I even proposed the notion of another suicide, finishing out the secret letter in words I did not have.

And when this ghost-boy pretended to be impressed, I had to admit that I'd only overheard Light's own failure.

I had to admit, I did not make sense, but I was illogically placed--a piece from a different puzzle just laying around, and somehow I'd managed to connive him into believing it would be stupid to just let me wander off to my own devices.

And because of this, it would've been pushing it to start calling out my demands...

Then again, I'd always favored selfishness to logic in the past, I could see no good reason to stop so late.

Except that there was no one here to make demands to.

Just me, a row of cheap plastic chairs, and a little girl.

She'd been staring at me for a long time, eyes wandering from mine to the notebook dangling from my fingers as if she knew what it was meant for. She wasn't very subtle, sliding from chair to chair, as if she could just inch her way over to me, and because she had cute little pigtails and a big yellow duck on her school jumper I'd just pretend it was okay.

And when she yanked the book out of my hands, I'd just pretend it was okay. When she flipped it open backwards first, right up to the last page of my crayola masterpiece, I wouldn't say a word, just because I was supposed to believe that she didn't know any better.

"Did you make this?" she asks, in an astoundingly articulate voice.

I say, "Yes," offhandedly, and don't really look at the page she's pointing to, ashamed I haven't yanked it back from her yet and smacked her over the head with it.

I don't like her, I decide too quickly. She reminds me too much of myself. Ignorant of her surroundings. Locked out by those in charge. I wonder briefly which sad couple she belongs to, what bad news they're waiting to hear.

"Can you teach me to write that small?"

I get halfway through my _no_ before I really think about what she's asked me. " _What?_ "

"Can you teach me to write that small?" she asks again, tiny finger pointing to the letters scratched under my scribbled sketch-work so tiny they might as well be invisible.

I yank the book from her hands too harshly, too fast. The paper slides against her skin with just enough speed and just enough pressure to neatly slice it open, and she yelps before I have time to slap a hand over her mouth. Her eyes are watering up at me, and somewhere deep inside my stomach a flame of guilt ignites and flickers for half a second before being smothered out of existence by pure shock.

Because there are words underneath my picture.

Tiny, tiny words.

Tiny, tiny words that I can't remember writing, and they're strikingly internal in a way I don't know how to describe. _The images flash so quick,_ I don't have to read the rest of the sentence to know what it says, because the words I would choose now are the same as the words I had chosen then, and it occurs to me half a second too late every new line I read, every three words I skip.

The girl has left, crying back to her mother somewhere I'm too blind to see, and a shadow looms above me, imposingly, threateningly, _dangerously_.

I can't close my Death Note fast enough.

Yagami Light says, "We need to talk."

The white tiled hallways and stainless steel elevators are a blur, as are the faces we pass on our hostage-captor trek down to and out of the first floor lobby, and I'm left standing awkwardly, back to the brick wall of the building, trying to rub the pinched feeling in my bicep away from where he'd yanked me along. He looks angry this time, eyes narrowed down to try and focus through my skin, to see where each major artery is so he can rip it out from under my flesh, which I actually find to be a small comfort, now less unnerved on having to match his worn off outsides with his twisted up insides.

He's got the book out of my hands before I can say anything, it's perfect application of speed and pressure forming again in a long streak of red across my palm, and the small flicker of guilt flares up in my abdomen again.

The irises trapped within his skull dilate even further when the thin strip of black leather is fully in his possession. They dart from side to side, looking for what--I can't imagine--before turning back to me.

"What the hell is this?"

And with my focus turned inward for the first time in a long while, I suddenly find the good grace to feel indignant. Just who the hell did this boy think he was, pulling me around like some sort of horse, demanding things of me like _I_ was the goddamned criminal here?

But Ryuk answers, "It's not mine," before I have a chance to open my mouth.

He's got the thing flipped open, turned sideways, trying to read the fine print behind the colored wax of the first page, but it occurs to me too slowly that he can't manage. It's too distorted, too small, and unless he'd known what it had said once before he'd never guess what the little squiggles meant now.

"Where's her Death God?"

And Ryuk shrugs, and I smile. I'm really quite surprised he hasn't hit me yet.

Light looks dissatisfied on the whole, when his eyes finally focus in on mine, and I don't understand what he means when he tells me, "I don't know how you have no public records, or how you covered up your paper trail into this country, but when I find out, _this_ won't be able to save you."

He throws the book at my head, and I'm too busy thinking to duck. The corner makes contact with my skull, bending inward minutely before dropping to the ground like a stone, inbetween a piece of used bubble gum and an old cigarette butt.

I have to wonder what could make a boy as calm and collected, as diabolically calculated as Yagami Light lose his temper; I pretend I'm not honored.

He's walking away by time I bend down to pick it up, and as the blood rushes to my head, my brain kicks into gear, and his words finally strike me.

Yagami Light was looking for my name.


	7. Chapter 7

I couldn't find a good place to sleep. 

Wandering the streets with my hands tucked awkwardly into my pockets, every back alley seemed shady and every park bench became a potential deathbed. Even the most innocent of passerbies morphed into unrealistic serial killers; the man rushing out of the 24-hour drug store must've had a .45 tucked in his waistband, and the girl with the long blonde pigtails stared at me as if I had three heads that _all_ needed removal. 

I hurried past everything, on my trek to no where. I followed a left-behind trail of gum-spots and broken glass in circles. I couldn't look the man on the cigarette-run in the eye, I averted my face to the blonde girl's striped stockings. 

I walked _endlessly_.

Because I was too afraid to be homeless, and there was _no good place to sleep._

 __I screamed when she tagged me.

I must not have been walking that long, if she was still following me, but it had seemed as if I'd been making figure eights around the same drugstore for hours now, every step becoming more vulnerable, hyperaware. Every second was spent straining every sense I had for the impending brawl I knew was coming. 

It seemed preposterous I hadn't heard her approach. 

But the brush of leather against my shoulder sent me jumping so high, my feet could not regain their grip on the ground and I was sent hurtling down to my doom, landing squarely, palm down, on one of the pieces of broken glass I'd been following. 

I hissed in a breath, to breathe out some obscenity or other, but the leak of air from my mouth paused as my eyes shot upward, to matching sets of white legs--one made of stripes, and one made of bones. 

They wore contrasting expressions of the same spectrum, the faces attached to the same bodies as the legs. The little blonde girl was the epitome of interest, face awe-struck as if something mystical and special had just fallen into her arms--almost as if she believed I were the last fucking unicorn, the creature beside her remained the very definition of indifference--aloof, nonplussed, and certainly not impressed with the homeless girl, knocked flat on her ass with nothing but a book. 

But the girl's face crumpled from glee to horror as she realized what she'd done, and lent a hand to haul me to my feet, gushing, "Oh God, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for... well, I didn't think you would--"

I almost jabbed my impaled hand out at her, and let her grip the other end of the fragmented glass still ingrained in my skin, but I thought better of myself and stumbled to my feet on my own. Holding the appendage up for inspection, I carefully slid the offending litter from the burrowed little home it had created, brain idly fluttering through infections, and gangrene, and amputations before I realized she was still speaking to me. 

"--and I never imagined that you'd be a woman. It was just so unexpected, and I didn't know what to say, so I thought I'd just show you, and--"

"What?"

She stopped with all the grace and social etiquette of a freight train. "--I guess it really isn't that hard to think that Kira could be a woman, but I really am very sorry, and, oh, God, I'm so stupid." She held out her hand again, I suppose this time for me to shake. "I'm Amane Misa!" 

Again, my hand half reached out, waiting to smear all the fresh blood leaking out of it onto her neat, clean little palm, but I reigned myself in again in time to straighten my posture and say, "I think you've got the wrong person."

And she smiled at me. 

She smiled bright, and wide, and adorably, and told me, "Oh, no, it's okay. I know your secret." She held the scrap of leather out to me again. "I've got one too!" 

And though I really couldn't read what was scrawled out across the top of the notebook, I was fairly certain I knew what it meant and what it was used for. "I really don't think--"

"I have _the eyes_ ," she explained; "I _know_ it's you, Kira. You can't see the life someone who else who has a Death Note has left!"

"But I don't have--"

"Why are you being like this?" she asks in a tone so heart-broken I almost have to look away in shame. "I just wanted to thank you and to help you. I know I'm not all that... great... but..." And it's here she starts crying, and I have to look down to my blood-stained hand so I don't have to watch her struggle between sniffles to bite out her words, "I can... help somehow... right?" 

My face is a mask of discomfort. 

Her creature speaks for the first time, a breathy, deep voice. She is serious and intimidating. I think she might be able to beat Ryuk in a street fight. "Misa, I don't see her shinigami. Maybe this is the wrong human."

"But it _has_ to be, Rem!" she wails right back, and points to an empty space above my head. "It _says,_ 'Ashley Mari--'"

"I've got to go, I'm sorry," I clip the words carefully, and turn around in quick, robotic steps. 

I sprint out around the corner, through the back alley and behind the drugstore. The dumpster smells funny, but there's a loading dock beside it, left half an inch open. It's not a terrible lot, but enough for me to pry my fingers under the the shaky metal and push it up enough to crawl through. I scramble to pick a box of soap off of one of the stock-shelves and set it between the sliding doorway and the floor, so as not to be locked in. 

If anything, I decide, being homeless is adventuresome, and I congratulate myself on finding such a resourceful haunt as this. It's maybe another twenty minutes before I stack up the courage to swipe a bottle of peroxide from the makeshift wooden shelf, clearly nailed together from what used to be a pretty shabby crate and pour it over my hand. I open a box of bandaids carefully enough to take just one to spread over my palm, and do my best to close it back up as if I'd never been inside of it. 

And I have to give the girl credit, because I never would've noticed she'd followed me all the way out here if I hadn't heard her monster hissing in chiding tones, and she stayed there quite a while, waiting for me to emerge, thinking over her predicament. 

She was there long after I drifted off, head pressed against the floor, one eye peeking out the crack between the floor and the door, but in the morning, by time the police got there, she was already long gone. 

Loneliness aside, she really was a clever, little thing.


	8. Chapter 8

The clock on the dash flashes 6:32 from behind the black wire caging of my seat, and I can't remember if the sun is meant to be setting or rising. 

Judging by the traffic, light and unhurried, dusting by just outside of the tinted windows, I assume it must be night-time, though I can't imagine having slept for so long. I must've only slithered my way into the drugstore around 2 AM, and it couldn't have taken them more than an hour to pull me back out. 

I call out, "Hey, what time did you guys come pick me up?" just to be sure.

And when the pretty young man, with the long, soft-looking hair answers, "About five," he's rewarded with a sharp knock on the head from the man driving. 

"Matsuda!" he barks, "L said not to tell her anything." 

And I apologize on his behalf because, "I've never been arrested before; I'm still getting the hang of it." 

The one named Matsuda looks back at me with a sad face, probably lamenting the tragedy of a life so young and hopeful sitting in the back seat of this police car, but I'm too busy trying to do math in my head to care much. That's roughly fifteen hours between drifting off to the soft tones of a witch and her familiar and being shaken awake by a doe-eyed man to an uncomfortable pinch against my wrists. 

Geared back into present tense, I smile for his sympathy. "I still can't even figure out how to sit right." It's true. No matter how far up or down I move my bound hands, I can't find a position that doesn't make my hands feel like they're being separated from my arms. 

"You should try crossing your wrists, instead of holding them apart," Matsuda suggests. 

" _Matsuda!_ " the man bellows again. 

And his, "What?" is so meek and confused I almost laugh out loud. 

"Not until we get back to the compound!" 

Quietly, I thank the man in the passenger's seat because even if the metal is digging painfully into my back now, I'm starting to regain the feeling in my finger tips, and avoid pointing out that the man driving has revealed more in his outbursts than Matsuda's cuffed sitting techniques could ever hope to. 

There's two security gates to crack through at this 'compound' that looks more like an office building than a prison, maybe even an upscale hotel. One way or the other, I'm fairly certain it's no prison block, and any embassy would be half the size, so my criminal record remains off the record--a small favor I keep for myself.

I'm not sure why suddenly the bag is necessary, but the black cotton is tossed over my head before I have any time to properly ask. Too stupid to have swiped any cold and sinus medication, my breathing easily becomes haggard, oxygen now having to fight between cloth and my clogged nasal cavity to reach my lungs. 

They're dragging me so fast around the corner, up the stairs, to the stuffy elevator, I can't recall turns. The elevator passes so many soothing chimes, I've lost count of floors. 

I am lulled into the sightless, soundless black-masked world, my only mission to keep breathing. 

Somewhere in between my skin has become hyperaware of any sensation, struggling to make up for missing factors. My clothing suddenly feels heavy, the brush of Matsuda's hand trying to steady my arm lingering unbearably longer than it should, the feel of his companion's grip bearing right through flesh and muscle tissue right down to bore through my bones. 

This is why my scream is sudden and ear-piercing. This is why I jolt in their grip to try and escape that terrible slashing sensation at the back of my neck. 

Because I'm certain someone is trying to remove my head from my body, or neatly snip my spinal cord in half, and my hands are still bound so tight I can't reach up to feel for blood, though I try, and somehow I end up writhing on my knees with these two officers trying to pull me back up. 

I can hear that laugh. That terrible guffawing laugh, squeaking and cracking like a broken staircase.

And now coughing because I'm choking so hard from trying to breathe, the sound of, " _Motherfucker,_ " doesn't come out quite the way I'd envisioned it. 

I think they're worried I might not regain my ability to breathe because these men are not used to rough-and-tumble interrogations. They're not used to administering psychological abuse, so the black bag rips itself off my head, revealing a world shockingly brighter than I remembered leaving it. 

I squint because the only thing I can see beyond white is a shivering mass of blurred black feathers. 

Their feet step right through the demon's shaking shoulders. Apparently he finds his practical jokes quite funny, as I realize he must've only pinched me, or scratched me, or something as equally harmless yet painful, but I'm too fascinated by the way my feet drag over his quaking stomach instead of through like the others. 

I pull my toe sharply over his ripped smile, pressing it forcefully down on his face until I hear a satisfying crack. 

All too quickly Ryuk's laughing stops, and there's a sickening symphony of pops until he's positioned his stub of a nose back into its original position. 

I try not to glare when they place me before the imposing high-backed chair because I know how unimpressed I'll be when L turns around, crouched in that terrible awkward position of his, hair matted and eyes swollen from lack of sleep. I'm surprised I can be even less enthused when he asks the typical cop question. 

_Do you know why I pulled you over?_

__"Do you know why you're here?"

There is, of course, a number of valid answers to this question, _because you're a dick,_ stays at the forefront of my mind, but _because Light's a dick,_ follows as a close second. I'd rather not break tradition, though, and so I spit out the typical wide-eyed,oh who--me?, "No idea."

"Have you seen the news lately?" L returns slowly. 

And I try not to look too obvious when I throw my elbow backwards at the familiar pinch of long fingers at the back of my neck. I can feel Ryuk's tall frame looming over the back of my head to peer at this boy before me.

I've waited too long to answer.

Matsuda is stepping forward, holding my Death Note in his hand. "Actually, we had a call in from the FamilyMart downtown. They found her sleeping in the back, figured she broke in through the loading dock, and she matched the description so..." His partner is sinking as the glory melts away from their epic capture. "This was the only thing we found on her. No money, no ID." 

L takes the book, and my heart skips a beat, because he's staring at the spot over my head. 

And when I whip around in horror to see if Ryuk's actually standing there, and he is, the monster only shrugs. 

"That was an awful long time to search for a girl someone'd already found," L comments offhandedly, flipping through the book, and I realize he's staring at the digital clock, welded into the steel walls, not the demon leaning over my shoulder, trying to exact his revenge in well-placed pinches. "This is the same book from yesterday."

And the situation hits me like a ton of bricks in the stomach, and there's a great heave before a cough of yellowish bile seeps out of my mouth and onto the floor. L is staring in disgust, and Matsuda's running to fetch a cup of water. Ryuk is just snickering more.

I take a shuddering breath. Because this is the same book from yesterday, and suddenly, Light's tight-lipped panic makes perfect sense because I had handed this pale boy a Death Note and he had seen nothing, and certainly the little girl in the hospital would scream over a monster if she cried over a papercut.

Something was terribly wrong. 

Terribly, terribly wrong. 

Matsuda's trying to pour a dixie-cup of water into my mouth, and I'm trying to spit it away as L notices, "She's written something in here, under the picture." 

He's staring at me appraisingly, and it is in this moment that I decide I really don't like him. He's different and weird, condescending and mean, and I can tell he's willing to lie just as far as I am. "Take her downstairs to one of the bedrooms on a security lock." 

The other officer is stuttering, "But I thought we were interroga--"

"She won't last a day like that," he shrugs towards the puddle of stomach acid on the floor that used to be part of my insides. 

Matsuda's leading me off by himself, and L's turning back to his wall of TV screens, flipping a recording back on. 

_"That's right! Police have confirmed the tapes delivered to Sakura TV are actually from a **second** Kira. It is highly likel--"_

__And I know he's done this on purpose. I know he's waiting for a reaction as I drag myself out of the room.

But I just feel like I'm going to be sick again, because if Ryuk's here then so is Light, and I have a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that this was all his idea to begin with. 

It was brilliant; I was the perfect scapegoat.


End file.
